1. Ishiba Released A Book To Show His Confidence To Be Post-Kishida
According to NHK’s monthly survey, which was conducted from August 2 through August 4, the Kishida Cabinet’s approval rating remained unchanged at 25%, while its disapproval rating went down by 2 points to 55%.
Although there was no announcement by any of the hopefuls to run for the ruling Liberal Democratic Party’s presidential election this week, former Secretary General of the party Shigeru Ishiba released his book titled “A Conservative Politician – my policies and my destiny” on August 7.
According to the media, the book is recognized as the foundation of his campaign promises once he announces to run for the presidential election.
For example, he advocates that a new ministry “Disaster Relief Ministry” should be established and National Security Basic Law should be passed to explicitly authorize Japan’s collective defense.
Ishiba keeps the highest popularity in the public though the voters of the election are limited to LDP’s Diet members and official party members registered at the party.
2 Nankai Trough Mega Earthquake Caution Released For The First Time
After analyzing the relatively large earthquake (magnitude 7.1) that occurred at the Hyuganada Sea off the coast of Miyazaki Pref. of Kyushu at 4:43 pm on August 8, the Meteorological Agency released a “Mega Earthquake Caution” that requires people living or visiting in the area (colored green in the below chart) where Nankai Trough Mega Earthquake is anticipated to be well prepared for a major earthquake.
Required preparation are such as reconfirming individual evacuation routes and belongings (flash lights, shoes etc.) at least for a week.
The Nankai Trough is a fault line (red line in the map below) from the Suruga Bay of Shizuoka Pref. through the south of Shikoku, which became the epicenter of the past large earthquakes.
The last Nankai Trough mega earthquakes occurred in 1946.
It’s been a while since the earthquake experts pointed out that the next Nankai Trough earthquakes should come within 30 years with the probability of 70% to 80%.
Since a Nankai Trough mega earthquake tends to have a pair of major shakings with just a few hours apart or a few years in-between, the Meteorological Agency released the caution assuming that yesterday’s earthquake in Miyazaki could be the initial one.
(NHK’s chart to show the area where caution is required)
(Wikipedia’s map showing the Nankai Trough line)
3. Nikkei Average Stock Price Declined Deepest Ever
On August 5, Nikkei’s average stock price went down by 4,451.28 yen, which renewed the largest declination (3,836.48 yen) that was recorded back on October 20, 1987 (Black Monday).
Economists here explain that unlike the Black Monday, which was driven by the U.S. economic situations, the crash this time was caused by investors’ overreactions to sudden yen appreciation (from 146 yen to a dollar to 141).
The yen appreciation was induced by a policy statement of Governor Ueda of the Bank of Japan on July 31 that an additional increase of the official rate is coming.
On August 7, Lt. Governor Shinichi Uchida held a press conference and stated that under the rough situations of the financial market, the Bank of Japan won’t raise the official interest rate for the time being.
The foreign exchange market reacted to this statement and yen depreciated to 147 yen to a dollar, followed by the stock market stabilization.
4. Japan To Support Central Asia To Establish Caspian Sea Route
The Government of Japan solidified the policy to provide Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan with ODA to establish new trade transportation routes to Japan through Europe so that the Central Asian nations will be able to export their energy resources and critical minerals to Japan without passing through Russia or China.
Japan’s ODAs are expected to be used to digitize the three countries’ present manual-based customs clearance systems and introduce global standard customs clearance systems as well as new inspection machines with large capacity.
PM Kishida was planning to visit the Central Asia today, but it might be rescheduled due to the Nankai Trough mega earthquake concerns.